from Part III - Industrialization and Catching Up, 1800–2000
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 February 2024
This chapter surveys the economic growth experience of Iberia since the early nineteenth century. After more than a century dominated by sluggish growth and divergence from Western Europe, there was a substantial acceleration in GDP and per capita GDP growth of both Iberian economies c. 1950. As a result, in the very long term, Iberia has partially closed its initial gap with the Western European core. The chapter also shows that, in the case of Spain, the early 1950s represent a divide between a hundred years of moderate growth dominated by factor accumulation, and half a century of fast growth led by total factor productivity (TFP). By contrast, this intensive model of growth was not shared by Portugal, where per capita GDP increases so far have been mainly associated to factor accumulation, rather than to TFP increases. Finally, new estimates of regional historical GDPs show that regional inequality emerged after the first long wave of modern economic growth and market integration. By 1950, the geographical patterns of regional inequality were well established, and since then they have just been consolidated. As a result, a poor Iberia has emerged that spreads over a continuous area around the border between Spain and Portugal.
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